MINNESOTA 2, MILWAUKEE 1 IN MINNESOTA (GAME 1 OF DOUBLEHEADER)
Date: Monday, August 3.
Batting stars: Danny Thompson was 3-for-4 with a double. Rich Reese was 2-for-3 with a double, a walk, and two RBIs.
Pitching stars: Jim Perry pitched eight innings, giving up one run on five hits and no walks and striking out six. Tom Hall struck out three in a scoreless inning, giving up a walk.
Opposition stars: Jerry McNertney was 2-for-3. Marty Pattin pitched an eight inning complete game, giving up two runs on seven hits and four walks and striking out five.
The game: There was no score until the fifth, when Roberto Pena singled, stole second, and scored on McNertney's single. The Twins tied it in the sixth when Thompson hit a one-out single, Harmon Killebrew drew a two-out walk, and Reese followed with an RBI double.
The Twins wasted George Mitterwald's leadoff double in the seventh. In the eighth, however, Thompson led off with a double and scored on a Reese two-out RBI single to give the Twins their first lead of the game. Hall came in to retire the Brewers in the ninth and preserve the victory.
WP: Perry (16-9).
LP: Pattin (7-9).
S: Hall (3).
Notes: Thompson remained at second base in place of Rod Carew. Jim Holt was in left in place of Brant Alyea. Jim Kaat pinch-ran for Mitterwald in the seventh, with Tom Tischinski going in to catch in the eighth.
Tony Oliva was 1-for-4 and was batting .326. Perry was 0-for-2 and was batting .306. Killebrew was 0-for-2 and was batting .304. Cesar Tovar was 0-for-4 and was batting .301. Hall had an ERA of 2.71.
Without going back through the box scores, I couldn't find out how many times Kaat was used as a pinch-runner. It was more than a few times, however.
It's interesting that Bill Rigney went with Hall to close out a 2-1 game. First, it's surprising to me that Perry didn't finish the game--he had given up just a single in the seventh and had retired the side in order in the eighth. Having decided to go to the pen, the choice of Hall was probably influenced by the fact that Ron Perranoski and Stan Williams had each pitched in three consecutive games. It certainly worked out.
Pattin threw eleven complete games in 1970. That was only good for tenth in the league. Mike Cuellar led the league with twenty-one.
Thompson had six multi-hit games in his last seven starts. He went 14-for-27 in those starts and raised his average from .200 to .282.
Record: The Twins were 65-36, in first place in the American League West, 7.5 games ahead of California, which had regained second place from Oakland.